Post-RTM fixes improve Windows 8’s performance and battery life

We're less than three weeks away from the general availability of Windows 8, and Microsoft is preparing for the launch with a set of patches it says will improve the operating system's performance, battery life, and compatibility with applications and drivers. The Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 General Availability Cumulative Update is available today via Windows Update for MSDN and volume license users who are already running Windows 8 on their devices.

Microsoft's blog post about the updates noted that, in past versions of Windows, these sorts of improvements were generally distributed only to particular OEMs at first. The company would then release to the rest of the user base as part of a Windows service pack later on. Because of improvements to Microsoft's testing processes, updates that bring Service Pack-level improvements to the operating system should now make their way out to more people more quickly.

Though the company didn't comment on how these improvements would affect future Windows updates, they do pave the way for larger patches and fixes to be delivered to the OS independently of big service packs. This may soothe corporate IT managers who still feel the need to wait for a service pack before considering a new Windows version. These kinds of incremental updates will also be especially important in tablets, where Windows 8 will be competing against iOS, Android, and other operating systems that iterate and introduce new features more rapidly. Hopefully, this will help keep Windows 8 feeling fresh for the duration of its planned three-year lifecycle.

32 Reader Comments

Yeah, I don't remember the last time I've downloaded an 170MB patch from Windows Update that wasn't a Service Pack or a new app... This should be fun. But for some reason the download is going insanely slow on the one Win8 machine I have access to right now.

I also wonder if this fixes the dynamictick issue on MacBooks. Will have to try that.

I also experienced slow download speeds on this update, but once it finished the system rebooted and everything seems to be working properly. No noticeable improvement in performance, and I'm currently plugged in so I can't comment on battery life. Still, I welcome more updates like this that address performance and not just the standard security patches.

"Hopefully, this will help keep Windows 8 feeling fresh for the duration of its planned three-year lifecycle."

Only a 3 year planned life cycle? Source on that? It seems decidedly short.

Windows versions are usually planned to have an approximately 3 year lifecycle (before the next version is released. Support lifecycle is much longer). XP and ME were notable exceptions.

Windows 2000 was also an oddball in there, since it was soon replaced by the merged 9x and NT codebase that was XP. I saw large adoption of 2000 in the enterprise, but XP Pro was replacing those installs quicker than I saw any other migration in corp environments.

Is there any hope of fixing the inconsistencies in the User Interface, or is that locked down now that it's gone RTM?

Care to elaborate? I have been using Windows 8 for a few months full time on my home PC, and while I won't claim Win8 is perfect, I do think its the best windows release to date. Which inconsistencies do you find in the UI? The "metro" apps versus the desktop?

Just installed the patch and one thing i noticed straight away was that i can now watch video, with no stuttering, whilst running a full screen 3D aplication, i.e. a game, on a 2 monitor config. Great stuff microsoft. Otherwise videos just didn't run, they'd be stuck on one frame or move extremely slowly.

Is there any hope of fixing the inconsistencies in the User Interface, or is that locked down now that it's gone RTM?

Care to elaborate? I have been using Windows 8 for a few months full time on my home PC, and while I won't claim Win8 is perfect, I do think its the best windows release to date. Which inconsistencies do you find in the UI? The "metro" apps versus the desktop?

Is there any hope of fixing the inconsistencies in the User Interface, or is that locked down now that it's gone RTM?

Care to elaborate? I have been using Windows 8 for a few months full time on my home PC, and while I won't claim Win8 is perfect, I do think its the best windows release to date. Which inconsistencies do you find in the UI? The "metro" apps versus the desktop?

IMO W8 isn't bad, it's much faster and it starts in less time than W7 even in my atom netbook but it seems unfinished. For example it lacks many little things here and there on the wifi part. There isn't a list of the saved wifi connections and when is connecting in WPA enterprise it doens't show info on certificates like on W7. Also if I can't use the Metro apps for the low resolution why do you keep updating the tiles? Or why you send me to the pdf and image reader on the metro side if you can't open it...It's like a car with a very good engine, a strange design, and many little things out of place inside.

The OS was probably beta to RTM and this patch brings it up to 1.0....

Beta->RC->RTM

You skipped a step. A single small amount of patches will never bring an OS from Beta to RTM quality.

Technicalities! lol Anyway, what I was implying was that the code was probably not completely up to RTM quality just yet but had to be pushed out the door to meet some really serious deadlines. This doesn't sound like a small patch since I believe someone said it weighed in at 179 MB. So this patch brings it up to RTM!

Personally, I would like to see them keep tweaking things for a few more months making thing better. Just simple things, like on the start screen you can sign out but can't sleep, restart, or power off the computer. The Charms let's you do the power stuff but you can't sign out!

Just a bunch of stuff like that, keep taking user feedback and tweaking stuff for via updates a few more months.

A lot of people probably have experienced W8 through a virtual machine. That's not really a fair shake. Many of Peter Bright's reviews were on VM's, and negative somewhat. I ran it under VirtualBox for a while. But then I installed it to one of my other drives under dual boot. I have a triple monitor setup. I was really pleased the way it was working so much better! Pretty slick! So if you only been doing W8 on VM don't knock it just yet, at least IMO!

It was RTM. If you read the article or blog post, they don't want to hold back many improvements to Service Packs anymore. So instead of waiting for a Service Pack 6 months down the line, they can be taken seriously in the mobile/tablet space by putting out more than security patches more frequently.

Your missing the point. Enterprise users wait because they don't have confdence in the initial quality. Whatever their testing procedures, Microsoft's quality is going down. I lost my Windows 7 system because Microsoft delivered a service pack with bugs. Enterprise users are going to wait on Windows 8 because its quality is clearly questionable. But more importantly it does not offer much value. Why would any standard desktop user want it?

The OS was probably beta to RTM and this patch brings it up to 1.0....

Beta->RC->RTM

You skipped a step. A single small amount of patches will never bring an OS from Beta to RTM quality.

Technicalities! lol Anyway, what I was implying was that the code was probably not completely up to RTM quality just yet but had to be pushed out the door to meet some really serious deadlines. This doesn't sound like a small patch since I believe someone said it weighed in at 179 MB. So this patch brings it up to RTM!

Personally, I would like to see them keep tweaking things for a few more months making thing better. Just simple things, like on the start screen you can sign out but can't sleep, restart, or power off the computer. The Charms let's you do the power stuff but you can't sign out!

Just a bunch of stuff like that, keep taking user feedback and tweaking stuff for via updates a few more months.

A lot of people probably have experienced W8 through a virtual machine. That's not really a fair shake. Many of Peter Bright's reviews were on VM's, and negative somewhat. I ran it under VirtualBox for a while. But then I installed it to one of my other drives under dual boot. I have a triple monitor setup. I was really pleased the way it was working so much better! Pretty slick! So if you only been doing W8 on VM don't knock it just yet, at least IMO!

179MB on a multi-GB operating system sounds like a pretty small patch to me.Consider that they have had 2.5 months to work on Win8 since it went RTM, is it any real surprise they can manage some 0 day patches to improve it?

You have to back that up with some kind of evidence, assertions or anecdotes won't do.

Windows has progressively become faster and more stable over time - Even Vista SP2 outperforms XP SP3 on the same hardware (which is beaten by 7, which is beaten by 8). (That of course excludes the 9x line, which was woefully insecure and would fall over if you looked at it funny.)

The number of security flaws has diminished over time. You've basically had to rely on social engineering and trojans to infect a Windows for years now. And it's compatibility is impressive, all things considered (and when it does fall over with old or incompatible software, it falls gracefully without locking up or screwing up your machine).

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I lost my Windows 7 system because Microsoft delivered a service pack with bugs.

It's always in the last place you look. Have you checked your sock drawer?

Sorry, I have a hard time believing that. I've not heard of anybody having trouble with 7's service pack.

Quote:

Enterprise users are going to wait on Windows 8 because its quality is clearly questionable.

You're half right. Enterprise users are going to wait, not because it's quality is clearly questionable, but that they think it's questionable. Most of them have never used it, and all they hear is the loudest voices (like Superslav) that repeat falsehoods and other debunked bullshit. Remember the emails flying around just after Vista release, talking about how slow and crippled it was because it's "loaded with **AA DRM"?

Reality has no bearing on these people's perceptions.

Quote:

But more importantly it does not offer much value. Why would any standard desktop user want it?

It's snappier than Win7, more responsive, quicker to boot, quicker to resume (I was blown away by how quick it wakes up from sleep compared to 7), and I prefer the start screen over the old start menu.

Why would a desktop user not want it? Sure, there may not be enough to get you to pay for an upgrade, but don't pretend it has nothing to offer.

Personally, the multi-monitor taskbar enhancements, power-user menu, new task manager, and general snappiness are probably enough to get me to upgrade (I shut down and start up still since Win7 has some issue with sleep on my mobo, so either sleep will work or startup will be even faster!). Though that might be more of a slight power-user's view than a "standard" user, if standard means my mother-in-law or something.

The fact that they're doing updates during the lifecycle beyond service packs is also a big deal to me. The (quite plausible given this news) rumor is that MS is going to be giving us some new features and polishing the Metro stuff over the next few months, which would be great.

I shut down and start up still since Win7 has some issue with sleep on my mobo, so either sleep will work or startup will be even faster!

I was having the same issue with my HTPC, but not my laptop. My laptop would sleep and wake up just fine, but my HTPC's lights and everything would blink back on after waking up, but no picture. Win8 fixed it for me - it sleeps fine and wakes up so fast I thought I'd left it running with the TV off. Brilliant

Your missing the point. Enterprise users wait because they don't have confdence in the initial quality. Whatever their testing procedures, Microsoft's quality is going down. I lost my Windows 7 system because Microsoft delivered a service pack with bugs. Enterprise users are going to wait on Windows 8 because its quality is clearly questionable. But more importantly it does not offer much value. Why would any standard desktop user want it?

What are you talking about? Enterprise waits because of the cost involved in updating, the sheer time scale involved in updating and the issues with compatibility after updating.

Also, as a linux work user and a mac home user I think you're going to have to back up your claims that Microsoft is lacking in quality lately.

was hoping the update to the Calendar app would fix my problem of it losing all my appointments from my Exchange account - but it still does it .

Not a huge deal, as I use Outlook for "real" calendar management, but it is handy to have that Live Tile view right on the desktop

Are you sure this is a client side issue and not an issue with your Exchange deployment/hosting?

Use Office 365 - so would hope that its not a deployment/hosting issue

Calendar is fine on my phone, in Outlook on two different machines - and on the web client, its just the Win8 metro app that loses my calendar entries - only solution (which is short term), is to delete the exchange account and re-add it

Andrew Cunningham / Andrew has a B.A. in Classics from Kenyon College and has over five years of experience in IT. His work has appeared on Charge Shot!!! and AnandTech, and he records a weekly book podcast called Overdue.